Thursday, January 12, 2006

Who's Getting All The Tickets ?

Following on from the complete farce that had thousands of fans paying a non-refundable fee to apply for tickets that they had no guarantee of ever receiving, it seems that it is no only the larger footballing powers like England that are unhappy with their ticket allocation. This week even Costa Rica are asking for more tickets to meet demand. For those that aren't aware, each country receives 8% of available tickets for each match. That means that over 80% of people attending each game will not be supporters of either team. So, who the hell gets all the other tickets ? The media, visiting dignitaries, mates of the guy who knows a guy who knows someone at FIFA, people buying favours, businessmen...yup, all the people without whom football wouldn't be the game we all love so much.Fans ? What are they ?There's something desperately wrong at FIFA and with the World Cup if they can't give fans of each team more than 8% of the available tickets. Sort it out, FIFA, you know it makes sense.Either that or don't start moaning when touts are all over the venues and fans of opposing teams end up all mixed in together. You can't have it both ways.